Internet & Computer Law Archives - Page 19 of 34

Firm Sues Competitor for Hijacking Name in Online Searches

Milwaukee Wisconsin Journal Sentinel: “Wisconsin’s largest personal injury law firm pioneered lawyer advertising in the state back in the early 1980s, but it appears it may have been asleep at the keyboard when its biggest competitor turned to Google, Yahoo and Bing. Someone looking for a personal injury lawyer in the Milwaukee area might easily type the names Habush and Rottier into an Internet search engine. . . . But the first result most major search engines return is for a Habush competitor – Cannon & Dunphy.”

How Far Must an Employer Go in Preventing Employee Internet Misconduct?

Digital Media Lawyer Blog: “Employers often wonder how far they have to go in preventing employees from committing crimes or torts on the Internet. In a recent decision, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals found that an employer is only required to prevent on the job misconduct that is foreseeable. But ’employers have no duty to supervise employees’ private conduct or to persistently scan the word wide web to ferret out potential employee misconduct.’ Maypark v. Securitas Security Services USA, Inc.”

May Employers Monitor Personal E-mail? Cases Turn on Disclosure

Wall St. Journal: “Companies Face Tougher Tests to Justify Monitoring Workers’ Personal Accounts; Rulings Hinge on ‘Expectation of Privacy’ – Big Brother is watching. That is the message corporations routinely send their employees about using email. But recent cases have shown that employees sometimes have more privacy rights than they might expect when it comes to the corporate email server. Legal experts say that courts in some instances are showing more consideration for employees who feel their employer has violated their privacy electronically.”

Prying Into a Teen’s Private Facebook Pages

Law.com: “Imagine gaining access to a teenager’s diary. Confidentiality is violated when an outsider turns the pages. These days, those personal thoughts are more likely to be documented electronically on social networking sites rather than on paper. But the same level of confidentiality can exist if someone wants to restrict access to just one person or a select circle of friends. That doesn’t mean all of those supposedly private communications won’t become public. Consider the case of Tatum Bass.”

Beware of Textual Harassment Liability

Law.com: “Imagine a supervisor making an inappropriate remark to one of his direct reports in an after-hours conversation. If he made the comment verbally, and the employee then reported it to the supervisor’s employer, any resulting litigation would have involved the usual ‘he said, she said’ situation, in which lawyers would have challenged the employee’s credibility. But what if the comment occurred in a text message? Then, lawyers for the company are at a disadvantage, since a written record of the comment exists. Harassment by text message — or ‘textual harassment’ — is becoming more prevalent. Texas and 45 other states have laws expressly criminalizing electronic forms of harassment, including text messages.”